The greatest tragedy of Brexit is the death of David Cameron's modernisation agenda

The burden of a financially responsible political party is to perform the hardest tasks. After the spending of New Labour, it was the duty of the Conservative Party to plug the gap of Britain’s deficit. Economic competence garners respect, but tough decisions rarely encourage affection. Having done the heavy lifting, it is hard to pivot to something else, to a political future of optimism and shared prosperity.

We will reflect the country we aspire to govern, and the sound of modern Britain is a complex harmony, not a male voice choir.David Cameron

Just a week after the Chilcot Report sealed Tony Blair's legacy, David Cameron’s is in equal doubt. His own decisions led to a situation where Brexit could mean the end of his modernisation project. And although Theresa May might yet carry it forward, there is reason to doubt she will. "Life chances" is in life support.

Watch | Removal men move into Downing Street

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Take the detoxification of the Conservative Party. This was much-needed after “Are You Thinking What We’re Thinking” and the electoral wasteland of the New Labour years. For all the stick Theresa May got for pointing it out, the Conservatives needed to be nicer.

David Cameron showed leadership on social issues, foreign aid, and bringing climate concerns into mainstream politics. For wavering voters, he presented a slick, clean image of a Conservative Party that didn’t want the state policing the bedroom, and which had moved on from just appeasing the base.

There's a lot we need to do in this party of ours. Our base is too narrow and so, occasionally, are our sympathies. You know what some people call us – the Nasty Party.Theresa May, 2002

Although it was Theresa May who first sounded this warning, she is much closer to the Conservative base than Cameron ever was and is unlikely to continue Cameron’s modernising, centrist strategy as he would have done.

Her coronation after Andrea Leadsom dropped out of the race means she will have hard work keeping the Right wing of the party on side; having inherited Cameron's slim majority, but not his acclaim for winning the 2015 election, she may not have much room for manoeuvre.

I hope she does. We may all be Brexiteers now, but many mistake listening to the outcome of the referendum with genuine leadership. It takes strength to take a political party out of their comfort zone, and merely Corbynesque cowardice to wallow in it.

Brexit’s appeal was that it was all things to all people. The Conservative Party shouldn’t try to be that, nor should it model itself around the most extreme, Faragian and Banksian strategy of stoking racial tensions and preaching just to the converted.

Watch | Cameron hums a tune as he heads back in to No.10

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Perhaps even more tragic, however, is the danger posed by Brexit to Cameron’s "life chances" agenda. This was to be the end point of the modernisation project, to show that the Conservatives were about so much more than just fixing the roof. This wasn’t about delivering an empty structure, but socially conscious furnishing. The Queen set out Cameron’s vision in her speech to parliament, the intention being to “use the opportunity of a strengthening economy to deliver security for working people.” Cameron clearly saw the need to tackle entrenched poverty through social action, and was planning to spend his final years in office helping the least well off through intervention and through trying to make opportunities more equal.

We need a strong, new positive vision for the future of our country, a vision of a country that works not for the privileged few but that works for every one one of usTheresa May

It’s self-evident that Cameron himself won’t get the chance to implement this. Nobody will even remember that he attempted it, overshadowed as his legacy will be so completely by the referendum to change the course of Britain’s history. Like Tony Blair before him, David Cameron reminded his party how to win elections, and like Labour, the Conservatives face the very real risk of forgetting what they were taught. Brexit means years of government manpower diverted. The best and the brightest won’t be focusing on helping the poorest in our society, but to clambering around for trade deals. In the long run, Britain may be better off from Brexit, but there is a real risk that it will come at the expense of opportunities for the very poorest in society.

True, Theresa May's early speeches have promised a "one nation" approach. But there are reasons to suspect that plan won't survive contact with reality. For while Cameron’s gamble on the EU referendum will have made many within the Conservatives happy, it has risked the Party’s hard-won electoral advantage on economic competence and arguably threatened the UK’s economic future. It is far too early to tell what Brexit will mean for the state of the nation’s financial health, especially in the long term. But in the short term it is clear we will face difficulties. The pound’s 31-year low against the dollar will hit Brits travelling abroad. Fitch and S&P have both downgraded their credit ratings for the country. Mark Carney and Credit Suisse are worried about a recession.

Watch | May: I have a vision of a country that works for everyone

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If that happens, the country is likely to slip once again into a mood of fiscal conservatism. The implementation cost of any meaningful program to help the poorest and long-term unemployed in Britain will seem unaffordable given the need to cut taxes and try to buoy growth – let alone the need to cut the deficit if tax revenues contract. Any desire on May's part to continue Cameron's work will crash hard against this new fiscal reality.

Ironically, putting such policies back means failing to help those who voted for Brexit. The least well off voted to leave because, in part, of the economic pressures that they felt were placed upon them by migrants. Concerns about immigration frequently unpack into fears over job security and housing, a sense that opportunities do not exist for the British working classes. This was why a package of measures is so vitally needed to address long-term unemployment, poor early education, and to finally tackle a prison system which fails to rehabilitate.

Today, it’s hard to see where the money, the manpower, or even the political will to address these issues lies. David Cameron’s legacy has been taken from him by the very people he was trying to help.